I think ICANN —

All your .lol are belong to Google

The search giant also requested .docs, .youtube, and .google from ICANN.

ICANN's application window for top-level domains closed today, and Google wrote a blog post announcing it had applied for a couple choice TLDs. While the list of requested suffixes has not been published in full yet, Google gave hints about which dot-whatevers it hopes to purchase.

Google said it applied for TLDs that are related to its trademarks. So .google, .android, and .chrome are probably on the list of its ICANN applications. Additionally, the company applied for TLDs related to core businesses—like .docs, and possibly .play, .books, and .maps—and suffixes that would "improve user experience, such as .youtube, which can increase the ease with which YouTube channels and genres can be identified." Vaguely, Google finished by saying it pursued entities the company thinks "have interesting and creative potential, such as .lol" (Dear Google: please let .yolo and .rofl be off the list—.brb can stay if it just serves up funky 404s).

The ICANN sell-off of top-level domains has been controversial with many businesses. Many have said they feel threatened into buying domains on other suffixes to prevent squatters that might tarnish a brand's image, especially true of .xxx-type suffixes. According to PaidContent, ICANN receives 18 cents every time someone registers a domain name, so the incentive to create many more domains (forcing brands to buy them up to maintain their image) seems like a quick buck. Still, the opportunities for more creative domain naming can't be ignored. Now, whoever buys cats.lol first will be the ordained King of the Internet.

To replace ICANN I suggest a cage deathmatch Royale. Any new policy gets a pro and a con team. One team gets to decide number of combatants up to three and whether it's all in or tagteam, second team gets to decide on weapons. Coin toss to see which team decides which, always a fight to the death.

The whole TLD paradigm is out of date. Its original purposes have been abandoned, and it survives only because it's familiar. Changing familiar things is frightening, especially when there is no good reason to keep the old OR switch to the new. Hence the groaning from all the big interests who want things to stay as they are.

To the extent the TLD expansions contribute to the dilution of TLDs, I'm all for it.

Some of these seem too specific to be useful. I mean, .google obviously just is so we won't have to type .com at the end. Does that make the internet better? .android I could see a very weak argument that Android apps might each have their own site. Very, very weak. But only if they do something extremely punitive to prevent grabbing other people's trademarks and using them or squatting on them.

Not only it will completely drop down value on existing domains, in particular .com but its killing the Internet content creation. People do not feel incentive to register their domain anymore for their blog or personal site. Its always again business that are hit with this taxes which need to protect their brands.

More does not mean better. Just look at all the domains that are available now and people still want to stick to .com, .net and .org for a simple reason. The more choices you give people the less they want to choose.

This means that they are completely fragmenting the internet even more with this.

The TLD game is getting more and more ridiculous. Is no one in charge anymore? Someone sensible I mean.

ICANN's about as sensible as it gets. Got any better ideas? I can't think of any personally.

Well, it must be possible to form something more sensible than this current mess. I mean, just pick a (one) principle and stick with it. How hard can it be?

The current system is a mess....unfortunately, if this isn't as simple as just being a money-grab, then ICANN is acting the cook who adds more pepper to the dish to counteract the fact that it has too much salt. Simply adding more spice isn't going to fix the problem here.

It seems I'm in the minority, but I'm pretty happy with the generic TLD thing

For now, if you wanna seem serious/business-like, you have to have a .com (or sometimes your country's TLD is ok, but still not as good). The fact is, most of the useful ones are already taken, and you ends up with a "2nd tiers" TLD which seems suspicious to uneducated Internet users.

Generic TLD will IMHO removes that "sacred aura" from .com.

Moreover, I expect that we will soon be used to go to .google / .microsoft / .ibm for all theses big companies' services and the generic domains such as .com / .org / .website will be a little more available for personal websites/small companies.

Yes ICANN will probably get a bunch of dollars from the operation but I don't care much about this.

Just an idle thought here: how much software will choke on any TLD that's longer than three characters?

TLD:s longer than three letters has been around for years, .info, .mobi, .name and so on, not to mention the .local TLD (which is LAN-only, but most software ought to be agnostic to the type of network the device is connected to).

kushal_one wrote:

I'd rather Google have all the .* domains. That is not my first choice but I feel they are safer in Google's hands than in the hands of ICANN now.

As a Goole-searching, Gmail-using, G.Maps API-learning, Google Apps-wielding, Sometimes Chrome-using person I'd respectfully disagree. I would never trust Google (or any other for-profit enterprise, especially one that earns money on information about me) with that much power over the internet.

Not so much. In capitalism you would have competition on the open market.ICANN right now is a defacto monopoly.Learn what you are talking about before you comment.

If ICANN wasn't handling the TLDs, we probably would have had gTLDs long before.

No matter who operates the TLDs I see it going two ways. Either they hard line enforce "proper" use of TLDs (.com only for comercial, .org only for non profit, .net only for networks, etc.), or they would just say fuck it and hand out TLDs like candy. All depends on who is on the committee and how they want to sway.

We only complain because this change is happening after the general public has gotten engrossed into the Internet. If they had done this from the start I don't think any one would be complaining.

If some one wants to compete with ICANN though, feel free to try and get people to use an alternate DNS root.